Jacob Schiess started the first commercial embroidery manufacturing establishment in 1848 in New York. He came from Switzerland and within a year had his own embroidery plant in operation. All the stitching was done by hand by fifteen woman stitching exquisite designs by hand.
The development of machine embroidery did not take place until the 1800’s. Joshua Heilmann from Mulhouse worked on the design of a hand embroidery machine. Though he did not sell many, it revolutionized the embroidery industry. Heilmann’s invention was quickly followed by the “shuttle embroidery” and the “chain stitch embroidery” methods.
The beginnings of shuttle embroidery dates back to the 1860’s when Isaak Groebli, from St. Gallen, Switzerland, was inspired by the work produced on the sewing machine.
Around the 1870’s there were fourteen companies manufacturing embroidery machines in Switzerland manufacturing hand loom embroidery machines. Today there are four companies manufacturing schiffli embroidery machines.
In 1873, Alphonse Kursheedt imported twelve of the ten new embroidery hand looms from St. Gallen, making him the...